Smartphones

According to one intrepid member of Xda-Developers, the HTC One X has several wifi related problems that will either adversely affect the device’s battery life or prevent it from connecting to wifi networks.

The Xda forum member who goes by the name “Bigoliver” describes a simple procedure that he says can be used test for this wifi problem: gently squeeze the side back of your phone between the camera lens and the volume buttons. Watch for changes in the wifi signal. If you see the signal strength improve, only to drop back down when you stop squeezing, then your device has wifi connectivity problems. You should trade it in for a new one. If it’s too late for a no-cost exchange on your cell phone you’re hosed.

An HTC representative has posted in the Xda-Developers forums that the company is aware of the issue and is asking for feedback to help the company’s engineering team pinpoint the problem.

Thanks to Dustin Karnes at Android Guys for bringing this one to our attention.

Google’s Android director Andy Rubin knows and he took to Twitter to brag about it. Perhaps in an effort to take some of the attention away from Apple’s WWDC this week, Rubin decided to let his Twitter followers know that are more than 900,000 activations of Android per day.

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Rubin also used his Twitter message to deny rumors that he was leaving the company for the startup CloudCar. “No plans to leave Google,” he tweeted. “Oh, and just for meme completeness—there are over 900,000 android devices activated each day :-).”

According to a new study by ABI Research, the demand for handheld gaming devices has been on the decline since 2008. The numbers will probably be flat through 2017, but demand will continue for the devices, probably as a niche market. The study reports that both the Sony and Nintendo gaming platforms are losing ground as more gaming apps are developed for cell phones and tablets – devices with a growing market share.

Another report authored by NewZoo - Mobile Games Trend Report found that of 60,000,000... 49% of console gamers play games on their cell phone while 33% play on their tablets. The uptake of tablets is having its impact on games, from a consumer as well as a business perspective. Of the 60 million console gaming tablet users, an average 42% already plays games on mobile device screens. View an interesting Infographic on the usage of cell phones and tablets for gaming.

Key Take-Aways

Fresh 2012 data

Number of Mobile Gamers jumps 35% in US year-on-year totaling 100 million

The US counts 21 million tablet gamers

Growth in EU, based on five countries is lower: 15% or 70 million mobile gamers

Share of in-game spending continues to rise: 90% in US, 79% in Europe for both iPhone and iPad.

4.2 million iOS games are downloaded per day in the US. 2.4 million in key EU territories. Review 2011 data

Share of mobile gamers that spends money is highest in Asia (47%) followed by the US (36%).

Europe and Emerging markets show lower “conversion” at 26%.

A slight majority of paying mobile gamers is male. 58% in US, 65% in EU.

22% of American mobile gamers use mobile games as extension of a game played on a different platform.

While both Sony and Nintendo are expected to ship more than 38 million handheld gaming devices in 2013, that’s significantly lower than the 47 million that were sold at the peak of their popularity in 2008.

Here’s what senior ABI analyst Michael Inouye said about the future of the gaming device market: “Mobile devices will compete with dedicated handheld gaming devices, but select consumer segments like core gamers and those individuals who do not want or have a smartphone or tablet will still provide some demand,” “The addition of mobile gaming is not necessarily a zero sum situation; in fact, many feel there is plenty of room in the gaming market for both portable and mobile gaming.”

The launch of the Samsung Galaxy S3 has been an interesting one to watch. All the pre-market speculation and hype have rivaled what always ushers in a new Apple. Samsung is the leader in global smartphone sales, and, with the arrival of their Galaxy S3, they’ve proven they can create a device that is a serious Apple contender.

Let’s take an initial look at the Galaxy S3, and see if it lives up to the buzz.

Hardware:

The Galaxy S3 comes in two colors: marble white and “Pebble Blue” (although the blue has a distinctly blue-gray look). Its rounded-edges and HyperGlaze polycarbonate backing enhances the smooth (but not slick) feeling of having it in your hand. The Galaxy S3 is not a cheap-feeling phone. It's got a really solid Gorilla Glass 2 front, a well-packaged interior and a robust battery cover.

Samsung increased the screen size from the Galaxy S 2 ’s 4.3 to 4.8in for the S3. Its dimensions - 70 x 8.9 x 136mm - make it very slim. It weighs in at 132g, less than the Apple iPhone 4S. Compared to the weight of the One X, it’s almost identical. Overall, the S3 is nice to hold. Samsung has created a large device that doesn’t feel like one.

The display is a superb Super AMOLED with a 720x1280 resolution - identical to the HTC One X. The contrast is excellent and the screen looks very bright. Whites are more luminous. Animations look clean and crisp. You hardly notice the use of PenTile array technology.

On the downside, the auto-brightness setting makes for awkward transitions. The screen will notably dim and then brighten again despite there being no change in external lighting. The screen is readable in bright light, although not great in direct sunlight.

It’s nice to see a raised rather than recessed physical home button, though its short-and-wide, making it a bit more difficult to consistently activate. It might take some getting used to.

Sitting on either side of the home button are capacitive touch buttons for the menu and back functions. These are very sensitive. You might find yourself frequently backing out of apps by accident.

You can tell that Samsung really focused on optimizing the Galaxy S3 for performance.

Operating System:

The North American version of the device features a dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 SoC and 2GB of RAM. These specs ensure that the S3 will be LTE-compatible. By contrast, the international S3 has a quad-core Exynos processor and 1GB of RAM. Storage wise, there are 16GB and 32GB models available. Word has it that there’s a 64GB on its way.

It remains to be seen how performance is affected by the extra gigabyte of RAM. Samsung says that the extra memory won’t affect battery life. In a perfect world, more storage will improve app performance, load times and overall multitasking, but not draw a lot of juice.

While the Adreno 225 GPU inside the Snapdragon S4 SoC trails that of the Mali-400 that powers the international Galaxy S3’s Mali-400, CPU-based performance is still incredible. Single-threaded performance is a vast improvement over the Cortex-A9 of the quad-core Exynos 4212. The sacrifice is gaming performance.

Turn on the screen and swipe through the seven home screens. You’ll find that the swiping action is smooth in a way that no other Android handset has been able to achieve. Just looking at overall performance, Galaxy S3 is comparable to HTC One X, with the exception of a perceptible improvement to the smoothness of Android operation on the Galaxy S3.

Camera:

The camera system has an 8MP rear lens as well as a front-facing camera. From a subjective viewpoint, the rear lens took some nice pictures, but that’s just an initial impression. There’s a burst mode and a “best picture” function that will nominate what the software regards as the “best shot” from a group. Video can be taken at 1080p and the macro functions were very impressive.

The Android 4.0.4 with TouchWIZ Nature UX software makes the camera easy to operate with Android. For instance, it’s very cool when you can swipe your palm over the screen to take a screenshot.

The Snapdragon S4 SoC is a very efficient chip and based on early tests of the international version, Samsung has done a great job designing in features that maximize battery life. The Galaxy S3’s hefty 2100mAh battery is impressive. The North American Galaxy S3 should stay charged longer than the European quad-core Exynos processor, but it hasn’t lived up to the claims that it has double the life of the One X battery. In fact, we found the two to be almost identical. Take note that the Galaxy S3 has a removable battery. The HTC One X does not.

Digital Content

This version of S Voice is supposed to allow for greater voice control than previous iterations, but in testing, its performance was patchy. For instance, waking up the phone using spoken commands didn’t always work.

The Smart Stay function allows you to continuously read a screen without worrying about the backlight dimming. This is possible because of the impressive front camera.

A motion control feature allows you to automatically dial your contacts by raising the phone to your ear. Neither the Smart Stay nor the motion control functions were enabled by default, so you’ll have to dig through the settings on your phone.

Polaris Office is a nice feature for business users. It allows you to open Word, Excel and PowerPoint files on your phone.

Last Words

Well done, Samsung. Despite the company’s pre-market theme describing a design “inspired by nature”, they’ve created a functional and fun smartphone that may have attracted a long-term following.

Serious competition among smartphone makers is always good for us users. It gives us more choices. Samsung’s Galaxy S3, the HTC One X and even the HTC One S might mean you’ll have a tough time going with only one new smartphone.

It’s nice to know that regardless of carrier or network speed, all S3 models are identical on the outside. The difference is on the inside. If you’re in the market for a new smartphone, you might just want to wait until the Galaxy S 3’s June 20th release to make your decision.

The business networking website LinkedIn has confirmed reports that some of its users’ passwords have been stolen and leaked on the Internet. According to Finnish security firm CERT-FI, a forum member in Russia has claimed responsibility for stealing 6.46 million encrypted LinkedIn passwords and posting them online. In fact, with the quad processing power provided by today top brand cell phones and tablets like the:

could have easily been used by the hacker to perpetrate the cybercrime.

It is recommended that all LinkedIn users change their passwords as a precautionary measure. If you use that same passwords on other sites (as most people do), you should change it on those sites as well.

We want to provide you with an update on this morning’s reports of stolen passwords. We can confirm that some of the passwords that were compromised correspond to LinkedIn accounts. We are continuing to investigate this situation and here is what we are pursuing as far as next steps for the compromised accounts:

Members that have accounts associated with the compromised passwords will notice that their LinkedIn account password is no longer valid.

These members will also receive an email from LinkedIn with instructions on how to reset their passwords. There will not be any links in this email. Once you follow this step and request password assistance, then you will receive an email from LinkedIn with a password reset link.

These affected members will receive a second email from our Customer Support team providing a bit more context on this situation and why they are being asked to change their passwords.

It is worth noting that the affected members who update their passwords and members whose passwords have not been compromised benefit from the enhanced security we just recently put in place, which includes hashing and salting of our current password databases.

A new report suggests that the popularity of Google’s Android OS is due to peak in 2012. The market will begin a major shift towards a strong Microsoft Windows platform.

The market research firm IDC just released the details of its latest Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker report. The firm predicts that, while cell phone shipments will reach 1.8 billion units this year (compared to 1.7 billion in 2011), the numbers reflect stalled growth when compared to previous years. The major cause seems to be the beginning of a rapid decline in sales for feature phones. The IDC forecasts the lowest annual growth rate in their sales since 2009.

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IDC analyst Kevin Restivo was quoted as saying, “The smartphone parade won’t be as lively this year as it has been in past. The mobile phone user-transition from feature phones to smartphones will continue in a gradual but unabated fashion. Smartphone growth, however, will increasingly be driven by a triumvirate of smartphone operating systems, namely Android, iOS and Windows Phone 7.”

The smartphone market is expected to continue growing over the next five years, but IDC sees 2012 as the start of a major shift. Android has a big lead in the number of devices sporting its popular OS – predicted to be a 61% share by year-end. Apple’s iOS takes second place with 20.5%, one-third the size of Google’s market. The upstart Microsoft Windows/Windows Mobile will probably end 2012 with a 5.2% share of the market, less than one-tenth the size of Android. By 2016, the IDC says the numbers will look significantly different.

They predict that smartphone shipments will continue to grow through 2016, but this timeframe will see a big decline in Android OS use. It will probably peak in 2012 and then begin to lose significant market share to the Windows Phone platform. Apple’s iOS will probably see some decline as well.

Here are the IDC’s predictions. Between 2012 and 2016, Android’s share of the global market will decline more than 7% - from 61% to 52.9%. Apple’s iOS will become slightly less popular, going from 20.5% to 19%. Microsoft will be the big winner, with a quadrupling of its market share from 2012’s measly 5.2% to 19.2% in 2016. This obviously surpasses iOS as the No.2 smartphone platform in the world, not to mention ought to cause Google execs some sleepless nights.

“Underpinning the smartphone market is the constantly shifting OS landscape,” IDC analyst Ramon Llamas said. “Android will maintain leadership throughout our forecast, while others will gain more mobile operator partnerships (Apple) or currently find themselves in the midst of a major transition (BlackBerry and Windows Phone/Windows Mobile). What remains to be seen is how these different operating systems – as well as others – will define and shape the user experience beyond what we see today in order to attract new customers and encourage replacements.”

IDC expects RIM’s smartphone market share to stay relatively flat for the next few years. It will probably hold steady at around 6%. Other smartphone platforms can only expect a mere 3% of the market by 2016, down from 7.2% in 2012. Samsung’s Tizen platform makes up the majority of that 3%. Sorry Samsung. Maybe you should concentrate on Galaxy S IV and beyond.

The debate rages on over Apple’s insistence that its mobile and desktop platforms remain closed. The Electronic Frontier Foundation published a report calling for Apple to adopt a more open model for its iOS and OS X.

EFF calls Apple’s platforms “beautiful crystal prisons,” because they impose unnecessary limitations on its devices. EFF’s position is that Apple is hurting users by shutting out developers in the open source community. It should mimic Android’s open source model as this is part of the reason for its widespread use by so many device manufacturers.

On the other side of the argument are those who point out that Apple’s closed model is not just a benefit but one of the most important features of its mobile and desktop devices.

Eric Testorff, a Technology Coordinator in Crossville, Tennessee, points out the benefits of a closed system in the education environment. His position: “Thank God Apple is the way it is, especially with so many schools purchasing iPads. It is good that it is so difficult for kids to download and install bad Apps. Not every school knows how to police that. At least Apple does some of the policing for us. With Androids, it’s like the Wild West.”

Apple’s App Store model as provides a level of security that is appealing to businesses as well. As an IT manager at a large privately held company said in a recent interview, “When we decided to dump BlackBerry last year, we ran trials with the iPhone and with Android phones. During the first week of trials alone, I had one guy crash his Samsung from installing a bunch of poorly made software. Then someone else rooted his phone and all of his stock apps stopped transmitting data. This was just the trial; imagine what would happen if we deployed these phones to more than 200 employees across the company.”

There’s no doubt that Ice Cream Sandwich users love the new Google OS, but that’s the opinion of only around 7% of total Android users. Gingerbread (Android 2.3) still dominates the market with a 65% share.

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Google had (and still has) great expectations for its Android 4.0 OS. Its rollout has been hampered by its availability on new devices, lack of upgrades to current devices and wireless carriers busy pointing fingers at who is responsible for the delays instead of getting their new devices tested and approved.

As more carriers debut their new devices equipped with Android 4.0, the ICS numbers steadily improve (they were up 2% in the last month alone).

According to the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) there’s a new standardized SIM format for mobile devices. The new “nano-SIM” cards are 60% of the size of the smallest SIM card- design currently on the market (the micro-SIM.) The nano-SIM will measure 12.3 millimeters wide by 8.8 millimeters high and 0.67 millimeters thick.

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Apple, Motorola, Samsung and BlackBerry, and others argued over the design of the proposed nano-SIM standard, but unconfirmed reports say Apple’s was the design ultimately chosen.

ETSI’s press release states, “The new form factor was adopted by industry with the involvement of major mobile network operators, smart card suppliers and mobile device manufacturers. The new design will be published in due course in ETSI’s TS 102 221 specification, freely available like all ETSI standards from the ETSI website.”

A SIM card is used to securely associate a mobile device with a customer account, preventing fraud and ensuring that calls are correctly routed to customers. It is an essential security feature of mobile networks, and is integrated into every GSM, UMTS and LTE device.

Sony’s PlayStation Suite is now open to third-party manufacturers, and it’s got a new name: PlayStation Mobile. Sony wants its new name to reflect PlayStation’s new mobility that allows additional hardware manufacturers to bring PlayStation gaming to their platforms. Sony hopes that developers will use the SDK for the PlayStation Suite to design original content for PlayStation-certified Android devices.

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Sony was pretty pumped about its PlayStation Mobile news when it was announced at E3, but they’ve got some work to do to convince third parties and consumers that they’ve got a program that’s worth getting excited about. Past efforts like the PlayStation phone and subsequent PlayStation Suite were under-whelmingly received by fans.

The first wave of HTC devices to join the PlayStation-certified list is the HTC One line of smartphones - HTC One X, HTC One S and HTC One V. HTC gets to be the first partner whose smartphone customers will be allowed to download exclusive games. Sony said that some of these would be PlayStation 1 classics.

Sony promised more PlayStation-certified phones this year, which would mean they’re lining up other manufacturers. So far, they’re not giving any hints on who else will join the fold. Sony hasn’t revealed a timeline for the PlayStation Mobile rollout on HTC handsets either. Essentially, there are no details on what third party developers will mean to Sony’s PlayStation Mobile brand.

What advice would you give to Sony about rolling out PlayStation gaming for Android?